Pentimento

Yak-ity Yak Don't Come Back

OK, this is a new one on me. No cute puppies or kitties for this guy. He brought a big one to work. Wonder what he uses for a pooper scooper in the office...

Fibromyalgia Combatant Endures Pain Daily

Some days, I just don't want to get out of bed. I lay there and think "I can't face one more day of feeling like crap". It isn't just that my ears are ringing from not enough good sleep, or that the cat just stepped on my leg and now it feels like it's on fire like someone branded it. No, it's just the pain when I am touched...anywhere.

To be honest, I am not just physically tired, I am emotionally and spiritually tired too. I'm tired of Lyrica ads on TV when I know that the drug doesn't help me.  I took it last summer and Hollywood wanted to cast me as a zombie. The only good thing about the ad is that it makes people more aware that there even is a disease like fibro.

Since "doing myself in" isn't something I would ever consider (bad karma you know!) then I haul my carcass out of bed and face another day. I shuffle down the hall and out to the family room.  The cat is in his usual place by the computer table, waiting patiently for his Greenies. Spoiled rotten little mooch. Good thing he is cute and has no bad habits. We may have to keep him another 16 years.   

Time to take my meds and get something to eat. Have to remember to drink my orange juice, or have something with ascorbic acid in it to help flush the lactic acid out of my muscles that causes some of the pain. I try to accomplish some project every day, but if I am having a "tired" day, I just can't do much at all. Some days, all I can do is a load of laundry, empty the dishwasher and rest up until it is time to cook dinner.

I long for warmer weather since the cold makes me feel like I'm paralyzed all over. I want to feel happy again. To have something big to look forward to. To not worry if I have forgotten to pay a bill, or someone's birthday. To hug my grandkids and just be around them more than I am now. To not have to feel the guilt because I don't drive a car. To not have to explain anything about myself to anyone.

Well, the pity party is over and the guest of dishonor is going to go take a nap now. Tomorrow is another day!

Shipping Deadlines: Mother's Day Is May 11th! Shop NOW!

Visit Cafe Pentimento and ship your gift to arrive on May 11th!

This is just one example of the items available. We also have fibromyalgia support totes, shirts and caps; gifts for the "GREG" in your life; funny stuff for the cat lovers and "love and smooches" for everyone. Come visit!

Get Your Free Rice Here

Here is a fun site where you can do something good for humanity, and improve your vocabulary at the same time. It's called Free Rice. All you have to do is choose which definition goes with which word. Warning: It is addictive! I ended up giving away 8000 grains of rice the other day! And found out that my vocabulary is much better than I had thought. Not that I use those big words every day, but I know what many of them mean. Do you? Come back here and tell me how many grains of rice you gave!

Recycle Your Cell Phone - Reforest The Earth

Yesterday was Earth Day, but that's no reason to slack off on your efforts to save the planet now that it's over. My daughter-in-law told me about iRecyclePhones and their goal to lessen the impact on our landfills while at the same time reforesting areas of our planet that need it.

Here is all you have to do (ideally, after you delete your personal information from the phone!): You supply the box and put the phone(s) you would like to recycle into it. Then, download and print the prepaid shipping label. iRecyclePhones.com, in union with American Forest, will plant one tree for each cell phone that’s donated. Easy, simple, and something good you can do for the planet. Now, go spread the word about this worthwhile effort!

Pentimento Helps You Go Green On Earth Day And Every Day

I just joined the ShareASale affiliate program and I hope it will help me promote some things I believe in.

Let shareasale.com find sales leads for you.  Only pay when it works!

 

You may notice a new ad in my Sponsor area for GoGreenSolar.  Not just because today is Earth Day, but because I think that we eventually will have to move to solar and wind power if we want our descendants to continue to live on this planet.  If I had the money, I would have solar panels on my house and anything else I could do to reduce my carbon footprint.  As you may know, we just put a new solatube in our family room, and even though it isn't a large impact on the grid, it helps us reduce our electrical usage now. See my post Indoor UFO's to see a picture of it in use.

I Just Wanted To Kill Him

Well, not kill in the literal sense, but I really wanted to scream loudly yesterday during our shopping trip to find a new TV stand. As we all know, unless you are independently wealthy, or the recipient of some priceless antiques (I am neither), most of the furniture you can buy these days for an affordable sum is particle board and bailing wire assembled. Even during the conversation with the lady who was helping us, she lamented that it is unusual to find real wood furniture anymore.

After making our choice of TV stand and getting the Suburban ready for loading, my husband decided that it was imperative that he put the bar across the back of the cargo area and then bungie cord the cabinet to the bar. Mind you, we were not going on the Oregon Trail, and all the streets around here are paved. With the exception of one of those damn speed bumps, it was all pretty smooth wherever we were going to be driving.

As he grunted and groaned and attempted to strap down that already heavy stand, that's when it happened. I had tried to tell him that it was probably not necessary because it "wasn't going anywhere" but he is of the mindset that he knows better than EVERYONE ELSE, so just as I was turning around to warn him that he was leaning on the glass of the door....CRACK! There it went.

I am not a screamer, and because I have fibromyalgia I try to keep my stress level down because it just makes me feel worse. So, I kept quiet until he said to me, "You don't have to act mad", "I'm OK, don't worry about me" followed by "It was just an accident", and I couldn't keep my opinion to myself any longer. I told him the reason I was mad was because he wouldn't listen to me and that we couldn't even get out of the parking lot of the store before he ****ed up what we'd just bought!

This isn't an isolated incident. He is routinely not careful with things. His actions show me that he is more interested in doing something faster than anyone else. His ego is going to be his undoing. Today, I had to order a new piece of glass to go in the door. So, our not-so-inexpensive TV stand just got $10 more expensive, and all because he is ALWAYS RIGHT. Not.

One day, long ago...

One day, long, long ago.......

                              there lived a woman who did not whine, nag or b*tch.


                              But this was a long time ago.......

                              and it was just that one day. (Men saw to that)

                              The End

No Blog Begging!

I saw a post about this today on another blog and I think it is something that needs to be addressed here on Pentimento too: Blog Begging

I have noticed that many blogs, including this one have subtle requests for donations, but some are just downright blatant. I mean, if they do ask you for a donation, that's fine. You can choose to do so or not. No harm done if you don't. I don't think anyone should be blogging if they can't afford the price of the service. If you got into blogging because you thought you were just going to get rich, it is like thinking you are going to win the lottery. Not likely!

So, if you need a college education, a new computer, money for a nose job, etc., don't post it on your blog. It is just going to turn people away at best. If I like what you write and you have a place to donate, I might drop you a buck or two if I have the money. Good blogs should be promoted to the max. Wanna read some good blogs? Here are some links to ones you might like:

Blog About Your Blog

Social Media Mom

Saphrym

Turnip of Power

Worth The Popcorn

No little birds were harmed in the writing of this post. :)

What An Ugly Entrecard!

I sure hope someone doesn't say that to me, but if they did, I know where I can go to get a new Entrecard design to make a better impression. I happened upon Romelo.com in my Entrecard travels and it was a pleasant surprise to see the nicely crafted designs he is offering.

Click on the link to visit his blog and check out his other 4 design sets. Oh, and please don't tell me my Entrecard is ugly...just drop yours on me!

Get Your Green On Kermit!

In my Entrecard travels today I stumbled upon a great contest that I think you might like to enter. It is called The Great Green Giveaway Competition at lifegoggles.com, and I was thrilled to see the green prizes we could win. Currently, there are 82 in the lineup with a total value of $3,681 / £1,840 Worth Of Prizes!

I can't list them all here, but trust me, they are really cool things like gadgets, books, personal care items, etc. Even if you don't want to enter the contest, you might want to check out the green products on the sponsor's home pages.

Becker's Amazing Animation

Some people would say this guy has too much time on his hands. I would say he has an amazing talent! Click on the link and make sure to move your cursor out of the way. You may have to play it more than once to catch all of the truly wonderful animation. Click the link or on the graphic.

Animator vs. Animation

Indoor UFO's?

It arrived on Thursday. We knew it was coming, but it was much more amazing than we expected. Glowing all day and long into the night. Long after sundown, close to 8 PM it was still there in plain sight. Oh, OK, it's our new solatube we put in the family room. We plan on walling off one end of the family room and making it into a laundry room/half bath eventually.

When we went to a home show a few weeks ago the company we used (Hanley Construction) for our new roof was having a promotion where if you signed up at the home show for a new roof that they would install one of these light tubes for free. I called and asked if we would be able to take advantage of that offer even though our roof was completed the week before. At first, I was told "no", even though I pointed out that we had just paid them $15K for the new roof. They came back with a counter offer where we would pay $400 and they would do the labor for free. I was really hoping for the home show deal, and told them so, but we talked it over and I called them a couple weeks later to see what had been decided.

During the time of the roofing job someone had accidentally broken our hose reel on the back side of the house, and to replace it would be around $50, so I asked Hanley if we could take $50 off the $400 price and call it even. That was agreeable, and the appointment was made for the solatube install for April 9th. The actual tube that was installed was a CrystaLite, not a Solatube, but they are very similar in application.

Just a little side note to this story. One young man showed up to do the job and he was right on time, polite and got right to work. He did have some tools in one hand and a coffee cup in the other, but he put the travel mug down and got going. The day before my husband had done all the measuring of approximately where we thought the tube could go (we have a French hip roof, so the ridge had to be considered, as well as the ceiling beams, etc.) and gone into the attic to move the blown-in insulation out of the way, put down boards for the guy to kneel on, ran a drop cord for his electrical tools and moved everything out of the way to make the job go easier and faster for whomever might do it.

The young guy was here by 8 AM, and as I said, got right on the job. About half way through though, as he was making several trips up and down the ladder I noticed he had his cell phone up to his ear. It obviously was not a "work" call because those are usually short so the guy can work. I hate to be negative about any of this particular job because the kid was so nice and did good work. But I question him going up and down an extension ladder with one hand (or none) with this cell phone. I believe in working smart, even in a small job like this.

The other thing that I noticed was that when he cut into the ceiling in the family room he used a reciprocating saw. I have watched enough home improvement shows now to know that there are ways to cut down on the mess and dust, but the main concern I had was that this guy had NO dust mask on and he hadn't even opened the patio door to allow some of that dust to blow out. I happened to look in the room through the passage door from the kitchen and saw all this dust and asked in a friendly but astonished tone, "Where is your mask?". Hell, I don't know if there is asbestos or something in the popcorn ceiling and maybe I have been exposed to it now too!? But what about him working this way all the time?

This Is Just Wrong, Right?

This gal was seen at a tractor pull...   Look real close at this "tank top".  Sometimes, I hold no hope for this country.